Brave

What age is this for?

Age

0-5

5-6

7-8

8-13

13+

Classification

What’s it about?

Merida is a young Princess growing up in medieval Scotland (a long time ago). Merida much prefers being outdoors riding her horse and shooting her bow and arrows than learning how to be a good princess. She’s quite a rebel and often defies her Mum and Dad. As a teenager, Merida learns that she has to be married to a young man from a neighbouring clan. This horrifies Merida and she runs away into the deep, dark and creepy forest.

In the forest she has to fight off a large grizzly bear and she meets a scary old witch. Merida asks the witch to help her make her Mother change her mind about having to get married. The witch gives Merida a potion which she then feeds to her Mother. This has a disastrous effect and was not quite what Merida expected. She now has to find a way to undo the harm she’s done.

What to look out for

Some scary scenes such as the large grizzly bear who attacks Merida and her father – he roars and lashes out at them and is very fierce.

The woods are very creepy as is the old witch who is toothless and scary looking.

There is magic in the woods that frightens Merida’s horse which throws her off.

There are some fight scenes and Merida’s Mother is nearly killed by a sword.

Some people are turned into bears.

Moral of the Story

The message of the story is that if you do something really bad, it takes a lot of courage to face up to it and fix your mistakes.